Re-Learning How To Live

Two recent posts make it painfully obvious that we badly need to re-learn how to live, so that we can get back to learning (makes me wonder whether living really is primarily learning, rather than simply entertaining ourselves...perhaps a topic for another day):

The way you think about your body leads to the way you treat it. Thinking in terms of what can go wrong induces fear, and fear is a very poor motivator over the long run.

The biggest flaw in the machine model, as I see it, is its rejection of the mind-body connection. When I was in medical school, no such thing existed. At most we learned about psychosomatic disorders, with the clear implication that they weren't real, being the result of the patient's imagination. This situation hasn't changed much in medical school, sad to say, but the surge in alternative and integrated medicine has brought the mind-body connection to the fore.

In reality your body is a process, not a thing.  Well-being depends on finding your flow, in terms of a relaxed but alert mental state, a steady positive mood about your life, following the natural rhythm of rest and activity, taking realistic, practical steps to reduce stress, respecting the need for a good night's sleep, avoiding toxins, and relying on your body's intelligence.  Continue reading....

-- Deepak Chopra

I am drawn to Chopra's observations, in general, and here as well. He comes from traditions of truth and faith that are different from the ones I am familiar with. But, his notions of a wholistic perspective of life are in line with what seems true to me. Our western predilections toward compartmentalization seem, well, unwholistic. And, while some of the attempt to isolate thing in order to understand them may be helpful, I think in large part the approach leaves some very significant things out. We are one being, not just a series of parts. And, treating ourselves (and life) as a bunch of parts, even if related, seems to create as many problems as it resolves.

Light & Flowers

As has become my early Sunday ritual, my time in the woods again this morning was particularly...lovely.  A cardinal seemed to use his red only to flash over and over that he knew a secret he want to invite me to see farther down the path.  There is something almost electromagnetic about running next to a flowing stream...I felt like I could follow it forever.  And then the smells.  I smelled the damp today.  And cool.  I ran by a jasmine plant that would out-rank most perfumes.  Another smell was so sweet, its stink almost curled my nose.

And, then, there were flowers, which seemed to just patiently wait to be noticed, carelessly even whether I did or didn't.  In the woods, where there is light...there are often flowers.  It strikes me that this is also true in a much larger sense -- true of goodness, of work, in children, in relationships.  In love.  Something seems to bloom, when there is light.

Impact Is Occuring

We tend to live in sweeps of time and circumstance.  There are times when we live quite aware of the impact we are having ...good and bad.  And, there are times when we can barely trace any impact.  We can chafe against this rather simple reality.  Or, we can relax in it...knowing that it's truth is not primarily predicated on our recognition of it.

Impact is occurring....

I was at a funeral yesterday, where impact from my life was revealed far more than I ever realized.  I was reminded, too, of impact on me...much of which I had forgotten.  Earlier today, I had a impacting conversation with a friend.  A few weeks ago, I was lost in a swirl of (perceived) nothingness.  At the moment, I sense how nearly every movement I am making right now has impact.  I don't expect that sense to last....

Impact is occurring.

We can live a lot of the time out of a dread (or just simple worry) of the future or out of a prevailing sense of regret over the past.  Our opportunity, though, is to live 'alive' to the present, with a deep wonder about both the bursts of wonder and the tediums...of the moment.

Impact is occurring....

The Impact of Sleep on Learning

More fascinating scientific support for what the wise probably have always known regarding the value of sleep:

Research teams from the U.S. and China have discovered some of the ways in which sleep consolidates memory and learning. In the study, the scientists were able to actually see new connections being formed while we (or in this case, mice) sleep. The study also found that getting more sleep led to higher performance than training more and sleeping less.

Then there is the growing awareness of the importance of sleep for workplace performance.

Sleep affects virtually every aspect of cognitive performance, physical performance and creativity.  Continue reading....

-- Arianna Huffington

Wasted Moment?

I prayed this morning for sensitivity and wisdom in my interactions with people today - at work, at home, with people I expected to see and with people I wouldn't have anticipated seeing, etc.

I got in an argument with my daughter at lunch today...  So, what happened...to my prayer?  Was it just not answered?  Was it something I just forgot about too quickly?  Am I that fickle...?

Or, is it yet to be answered...is what I do now, my real opportunity...to be sensitive to her, and to myself...and to seek wisdom?  Perhaps the moment has not been wasted at all, perhaps it has just begun....

Too Much Sugar & the Brain

Overeating, poor memory formation, learning disorders, depression  – all have been linked in recent research to the over-consumption of sugar. And these linkages point to a problem that is only beginning to be better understood: what our chronic intake of added sugar is doing to our brains.

While a healthy diet would contain a significant amount of naturally occurring sugar (in fruits and grains, for example), the problem is that we’re chronically consuming much more added sugar in processed foods.

Research indicates that a diet high in added sugar reduces the production of a brain chemical known as brain-derived neurotrophic factor (BDNF). Without BDNF, our brains can’t form new memories and we can’t learn (or remember) much of anything.

What these and other studies strongly suggest is that most of us are seriously damaging ourselves with processed foods high in added sugar, and the damage begins with our brains.  Seen in this light, chronic added-sugar consumption  is no less a problem than smoking or alcoholism. And the hard truth is that we may have only begun to see the effects of what the endless sugar avalanche is doing to us.

-- David DiSalvo

Kindling A Flame

Education is the kindling of a flame, not the filling of a vessel.

-- Socrates

Learn

Live as if you were to die tomorrow. Learn as if you were to live forever.

-- Gandhi

Bears Our Burdens

Praise be to the Lord, to God our Savior,
who daily bears our burdens.

-- Psalm 68:19

I was recently watching one of our kids struggle with some details of life that seem...well, like things that would be beneath the normal concerns of God. So, I have been re-considering Peter's encouragement to 'cast our cares' on God. It seems we do this so infrequently or, at least, it doesn't seem to be our first instinct.

So when I read the verse above, the soil of my mind was already tilled.  He daily bears our burdens. What burdens? Which ones?  I often don't think of Him as doing this kind of thing for me...bearing my daily burdens.  And, if He does, I imagine, He must do it in some abstract sense and for the big things - things I know I can't handle.  But, it is hard to escape the specific nature of the words used here.  Burdens?  ...when I think of the type of things I tend to be pre-occupied by each day, I often don't think that He would (should) be very concerned about them.  They seem too...petty, or like things a bit below His pay-grade.

But, I wonder if this is largely much more my view of things than His.  It says daily.  He seems concerned and interested in rather specific details of our lives - the daily ones.  According to Peter, He seems interested in having me bring these things to Him.

So, what are the implications of not going to Him with the 'small' things of my life?  When I'm following my first instinct (to 'handle it' on my own)?  What part of my relationship with Him do I miss out on?

Choose

I was laying there.  "I can't move."  "I can't get up."  "I'm so tired."  "I feel awful," type sentences running through my blurry mind.  And, this, after what was supposed to be a good night's sleep....

But, the longer I laid there, the more I recognized a second voice...saying things like, "You'll feel so much better if you just get moving."  "You don't have time later in the day."  "You've done this hundreds of times, and you've rarely (ever?) regretted it -- get up!"

The 'discussion' continued until finally something rather simple emerged from the waking fog -- choose.  Which did I want?  ...both, actually.  How would I decide?  ...which did I want more?

Was it a mind-over-matter situation?  Kinda.  And, it comes down to choosing.

I got up, worked out, talked to friend afterward, and blended into my normal morning ritual.  I remember at one point noting how thankful I was that I had gotten up, that what does happen 9 out of 10 times...happened again, that I could encounter God in those few precious morning moments moving from A-to-B.

And, I ended up ready again for another day.  Refreshed.  Invigorated.  Alive.  Ready.

...all in about 75 minutes of morning transitions.  Gratefully, remarkable.

How many others things in my life am I, or would I be, so deeply thankful for because of the simple act of choosing -- of thinking about and deciding upon what I really want.

That day my mind was the wiser and really did help me overcome, what I otherwise was just 'feeling'.

Health-Span

It is well and long established that the vast majority of medical resources, and an enormously disproportionate allocation of health care dollars, are directed at end-of-life care. I am by no means arguing against such expenditures - my loved ones have been beneficiaries of them, too. But often, despite all such effort, only indignity is propagated, and death is not much forestalled. Almost never does such effort restore anything like true vitality.

Somehow, our culture manages to peddle both tanning salons, and wrinkle cream. We desperately seek longevity, while raising children potentially subject to a shorter life expectancy than their parents. We hang on every headline hinting at more years in life, and let the established means of adding life to years, and defending our native span, slip through our fingers.

This fixation, and the deus ex machina intercessions it invites, have brought us a widening gap between life span, and health span. Life expectancy has, indeed, been rising here in the U.S.- but so, too, the burden of chronic disease. We are living longer-but generally, not better. As we succumb to ever more chronic disease at ever younger age, yet do all we can to keep death at bay, we spend an ever greater portion of our lives not truly living fully and well. Not dying is not the same as living.

-- David L. Katz

Free Will and Human Dignity

Apple Store Changes Signal the Next Era of Retail

This week continues a series of 'randoms' (unless you can find a connection):

Furniture retail has learned that you can’t just sell furniture, you have to sell rooms and designs. Kitchen retailers are starting to teach customers how to cook. There are even new online clothing retailers coaching their customers on how to dress! (http://www.trunkclub.com/) Everyone thinks the Internet is killing retail, but really it is just changing its core purpose.

Before the Internet, we needed retail to SHOW us what we could buy, something the Internet does a hundred times better. However, a physical retail store can still have an advantage with showing us how to USE products, especially when we need to use multiple products together. Retail stores that innovate ways to be a gateway for customers to better their life or enter a lifestyle are the ones that will last through the next couple decades.  Continue....

-- Chris Hoyt

So much depends upon

the blonde woman who drops a potato
in the supermarket parking lot where it rolls
beneath the 89 Dodge Ram with rust patches
near the left rear fender from contact with
too much road salt during the winter of 91
which was actually one of the mildest on record
though the driver tends to remember it
as the season he was fired from his job
at the aluminum window factory where
he had worked for nearly sixteen years
without promotion as he shifts into reverse
and backs over the potato which squishes
as softly as a dream's last breath and leaves
slick asphalt for the lot boy to slip on
as he pushes a train of shopping carts
and sprains his lumbar vertebrae just
days before he is scheduled to leave
for basic training to become the cool
killing machine he's always craved
but will now have to settle for someday
making assistant produce manager
and marrying a girl he almost loves just
as the blonde woman finds herself
one potato short with dinner guests
ringing the doorbell.

-- Tom Chandler

We'd All Be Millionaires

If we could sell our experiences for what they cost us, we’d all be millionaires.

-- Abigail Van Buren (Dear Abby)

Fathers Day

There is no question among researchers that fathers who spend time with their children instill self-control and social skills in their offspring.

Exactly how dads do that, however, is largely a mystery.

Some scientists are inventing new scales and laboratory procedures to try to measure the father factor. One researcher watched fathers and children playing games like "Get Up," in which fathers try to get up from the floor while the children try to hold them down, and "Sock Wrestle," in which father and child try to snatch each other's socks.

The Father Factor:
Researchers studying fathers' role often look at how they act during rough-and-tumble play. Here are some positive signs:

• Father is immersed in the game emotionally, smiling and laughing
• Father shows spontaneity, creativity or silliness
• Father is good-natured about losing, with no signs of ego
• Father helps the child control his or her emotions and calms him or her when overexcited
• Father adjusts his effort and his technique based on the child's cues
• Father motivates the child to stay engaged and keep going, or rejoin the game
• Father is dominant but shares the upper hand, allowing the child to win sometimes

-- Richard Fletcher, University of Newcastle in Australia

More here from the WSJ.

It strikes me that there is a something very powerful that goes on with play between a father and son, not the least of which is a kind of presence that is, well, mysterious.  Among other things, it communicates that while the world rages on, in all of its fear-inducing demands, I can stop and look at you and be with just you, at this moment, because you, my child, are the apple of my eye.  As I reflect on my relationship with my father, I see that kind of presence with me.  I see it historically and I see it even now.  What a gift that is, to me.  Perhaps the greatest part of the gift is that this is the kind that automatically gives itself to my own children, through me.  Thank you, Dad, for giving to me and those I love in this way!

What a reflection that is of how God is with me.  Considering the article referenced above, I wonder whether God plays with me, too.  What if more people knew this part of God?  ...worth considering.

I Fear The Day

The truth is that one of the mind’s chief functions is to spot and utilize patterns as shortcuts, in order to process the multitude of information we observe each day.

We are more reliant on environmental triggers than we’d like to think.

-- Gregory Ciotti

Community

It often takes some kind of community to help us recognize these encounters for what they truly are.  And, to help us know and become what we've truly been made to be.

Encounters

These encounters often come in the context of disappointments, things we don't understand, failure...things that force us in often painful, yet merciful, ways to consider more than the straight-forward conclusions we have already reached.  Things that truly bring us to the door of...discovery.

Submerged

...in order to discover who we really are, that has been submerged deeply within us.

Outside Ourselves

So, we need to encounter something outside ourselves, something more than the distorted versions we otherwise become.

Don't Become Better

People don't naturally become better, on their own.

Never

By love God may be gotten and held, but by thought or understanding, never.

-- The Cloud of Unknowing

Congraduations Kenz!

We feel a deep sense of family and community in this milestone.  A heritage of faith and friends for our daughter is a gift beyond value.  Thank you...thank you to each of you for your role in her and our lives.  We are blessed by so much goodness.

More pics here....

Hate Comes From One Thing

We’re taught when we’re young that the opposite of love is hate, but it’s not. Hate is a by product, hate is a result. Being a hater isn’t cool -- nobody wants that. But hate comes from one thing: fear. Fear is the opposite of love.

-- John Legend

Cannot Let Fear

You cannot let a fear of failure or a fear of comparison or a fear of judgment stop you from doing what's going to make you great. You cannot succeed without this risk of failure. You cannot have a voice without this risk of criticism. And you cannot love without the risk of loss.

-- Charlie Day

Instead of Craving

Incredible change happens in your life when you decide to take control of what you do have power over instead of craving control over what you don't.

-- Steve Maraboli

Wrong Place Faster

If the ladder is not leaning against the right wall, every step we take just gets us to the wrong place faster.

-- Steven Covey

Comfort Zone

Life begins at the end of your comfort zone.

-- Neale Donald Walsh

Continually

Life (God) is continually offering us opportunities for humility.

We often don't see them, much less take them...to our loss, as well as to those around us...but opportunities to choose humility are everywhere.